How to Read Paintings: Chalk Cliffs on Rügen by Caspar David Friedrich

Love and danger in this beautiful scene

Chalk Cliffs on Rügen (1818) by Caspar David Friedrich. Oil on canvas. 90.5 × 71 cm. Kunst Museum Winterthur, Switzerland. Image source Wikimedia Commons

This painting, by the German Romantic artist Caspar David Friedrich, was painted in 1818 on the island of Rügen in the Baltic Sea.

Chalk Cliffs on Rügen shows three hikers testing their nerve on the edge of a sudden and vertiginous drop. Ahead of them, a set of jagged rocks gleams brightly in the sun.

As in many of Friedrich’s paintings, the figures in the image are seen from behind, shown in the act of gazing. Our vantage point is the same as theirs: positioned to contemplate the expansive view. It’s almost as if we can overlook the entire sea from here, a portal into the sublime through the natural fracture between the rocks.

But look more closely at the people. What’s going on?

Detail of ‘Chalk Cliffs on Rügen’ (1818) by Caspar David Friedrich. Oil on canvas. 90.5 × 71 cm. Kunst Museum Winterthur, Switzerland. Image source Wikimedia Commons

At first glance, it may seem as if the man in the centre of the trio has fallen to his knees involuntarily — as if he has dropped something over the edge of the cliff. Or perhaps the woman has lost her hat to a swift breeze: given the fashions of the time, she would certainly have worn one, like the men.